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Author of the best-seller Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, Judith Butler (Maxine Elliot Professor in the Departments of Rhetoric and Comparative Literature at University of California, Berkeley) is one of the world's most important and influential contemporary thinkers in fields such as continental philosophy, literary theory, feminist and queer theory, and cultural politics.

JUDITH BUTLER: Philosophical Encounters of the Third Kind is an up-close and personal encounter with this educator and author. The film features interviews with Butler — including reminiscences of her formative childhood years, illustrated by family home movies, as a 'problem child' — shows her in classroom sessions in Berkeley and Paris, at public speaking engagements, and in discussion with Gender Studies professor Isabell Lorey.

Does gender = sexuality? How does the family define gender roles? What are the dangers when society coerces gender norms? What deep-seated social fears are unleashed by those who flout those prescribed roles? What is New Gender Politics? These are just a few of the topical issues explored in the film.

In the film, Butler covers a wide range of subjects, broaching not only controversial gender issues-including transsexuality and intersexuality-but also 20th century Jewish philosophy, AIDS activism, criticism of state power and violence, gay marriage, and anti-Zionism.

PHILOSOPHICAL ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND, the first film profile on Judith Butler, will serve to popularize her insightful analysis of sexual identity and gender roles at a time when the cultural and political debate over these issues pervades American society.